Long Overdue Update

Better late than never, right? As I write this, my sweet baby girl is asleep upstairs in her crib for a nap. I sat in the comfy rocker in her room and held her as she drank her bottle, then accepted a sloppy wet kiss as I told her I loved her, before laying her down in her crib with her blankie and baby doll. And I still, after almost four months, sometimes can't believe I am able to do those things or that she is really here. To anyone reading who is deep in the throes of paperwork, or waitlists, or embassy slowdowns, or any of the other thousand steps that make you want to just pull your hair out and give up somedays...hang on. This day will be here for you as well. And just like I found with labor, when the child you have waited on, and prayed for, and missed from afar is home, you forget how bad the process was that got them there.

We were very, very fortunate in that Gabby was taken such good care of in Ethiopia. We took her to an International Adoption Clinic in early November, and the doctor was blown away by how amazing she is (we, of course, already knew that!). She said her attachment was going great, cognitively she looked great, developmentally she is mostly on target, and physically she is perfect. It was nice to get that reassurance from someone who has seen thousands of adopted kids, even though we were pretty sure of all of that already. She is a little delayed in her eating skills and fine motor skills, mostly from a lack of exposure and experience. We qualified for First Steps, Indiana's early intervention program, and she gets Occupational Therapy for an hour a week to work on these things. We started this in November and she is making speedy progress on the fine motor skills. Because she hadn't played with toys much at all, she didn't get how to use a finger to push a button, or open/close parts of toys, etc. She's becoming a pro! Her new favorite toy is a princess microphone that plays songs, and we listen to her push the song buttons dozens of times a day :)

Since she's been home, she's also learned to wave, clap, play peek a boo, give kisses and hugs (especially to her baby dolls-it's seriously adorable), feed mommy bites of her food, and shake her head to imitate a horse's whinny (the only animal noise she cares about). The big news is that she is finally a walker!! She came to us already crawling like a champ and cruising furniture, but took her sweet time building up confidence to take steps by herself. She took her very first steps in mid-December, and has finally become a walker. She still crawls from time to time, but walks the majority of the time, though still very wobbly. She also just figured out how to stand up without first crawling over to something to pull up on. It's amazing to see the lightbulbs coming on left and right as she learns all these things. She has started using a few words: mama, uh-oh, yay, and hi. She says dada, but we're not convinced it's really directed at Chad yet.

Things she loves (in no particular order):
-her brothers...oh, she adores them and they SO adore her. I'm kind of amazed that after several months home, her newness hasn't worn off for them yet. I think it might just truly be love, not novelty, that has them treating her so well. Now if only they would treat each other even a fraction as nicely!

-Gymboree...we started a play and learn class with her about two months ago, and she loves it! She has her class, and then some free playtime later in the week, and she has so much fun. If she's cranky getting into the car beforehand, all I have to do is tell her we're going to Gymboree and she cheers right up. It's so funny!

-mommy and daddy...of course! She is with me almost every minute, and I'd say she has completely bonded to me. She gets upset if I try to leave, even for the bathroom, she seeks me out just to check in and cuddle with me, and she knows that I am the fulfiller of her wants and needs. What's been more wonderful for me to see is the love she has for Chad. She LOVES him! If he comes home from work and doesn't immediately pick her up, she is very vocal about how unjust that is!

-toys...she loves the microphone I mentioned earlier, her baby dolls (she has more than a few!), and balls of all kinds. She still mouths things more than I think is average, but she's learning how to actually play with things now too. She also loves dancing to music now too, which is super cute.

We're still working on eating. After some trial and error, we are pretty sure she has some kind of milk allergy, so we've switched to soy milk and that seems like a good move. She loves certain foods-yogurt, cheese, banana, blueberries, but little else. She LOVED meat when she first came home, and now she won't touch it. At least she'll eat the Greek yogurt packed with protein. She's a sleeping champ, for the most part, and after we realized that she was done with a morning nap in early November, she now takes one good 2-3 hour nap in the afternoon and sleeps for 11-12 hours straight through at night. We are very blessed in the sleep department!!

What else...? We love her more than I ever could have imagined. She is so smart, beautiful, funny and fun-loving. She is pure joy. She is ours, and I can't imagine life without her!